Boesmans’ dark Pinocchio opens Festival d’Aix-en-Provence

If I wrote that I loved Philippe Boesmans’ Pinocchio, my nose may grow a little. Commissioned to open the 2017 Festival d’Aix en Provence, Boesmans’ opera finds the 81-year-old composer in collaboration with Joël Pommerat, whose libretto is based on his existing 2008 stage play. Between the two of them, they shift the tale far away from any cutesy Disney fantasy, returning it to the harsh reality of Carlo Collodi’s original fable.